WiFi Fun and Games

The WIFI connection downstairs has been a bit dodgy ever since I “upgraded” it with a device I got for an amazing price (can you tell what is going to happen here?). I’m pretty sure the discount was because someone had bought it, found it didn’t work and taken it back to the shop. It used to connect quickly enough, and then drop the connection at some random point in the future, just often enough to be really annoying. Its in the bin now. I can’t think of anyone I dislike enough to give it to them to use.

Anyhoo, I’ve recently come across these Tenda routers that you can get from eBuyer for the bonkers price of 12.48 pence:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/169923 

They don’t replace the venerable Netgear DSL device that links me to the awesome power of Karoo, but then again I don’t want them to. What I want them for is to spread some WIFI around the house. They are designed to sit on the end of a broadband modem and provide WIFI and four more 10 base T ports. However, by ignoring the modem connection you can use them as WIFI access points. You can also use them to extend and bridge a wireless network if you are happy twiddling with the settings.

I just turned off their DHCP support (so they don’t go around offering network addresses to all and sundry) and set them up as WIFI access points hanging off the wire running around the place. I initially used one as a repeater to extend the coverage, but since that means I end up with a bunch of stations sharing one channel I decided to just make a new network instead. There is a nice little HowTo in amongst the reviews if you are new to this kind of thing.

So far so good, with speed and range nicely improved.